Decodings

A letter in response to Malcolm Gladwell’s article (May 10, 2010)

Malcolm Gladwell’s review of “Operation Mincemeat” is a delightful rumination on the pitfalls and dubious utility of feeding false intelligence to an enemy (A Critic at Large, May 10th). Gladwell refers to these fabricators of intelligence as members of the Twenty Committee, but does not discuss the interesting origin of the group’s name. “Twenty” derived from the Roman numeral XX, which itself was an allusion to the “Double-Cross System,” run by the Committee, of turning enemy agents in place and fabricating intelligence deceptions to employ against the Axis powers.

Francine Mathews

Denver, Colo.

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